Happy Wednesday!

Yesterday, we hosted a Pastors Lunch at Destiny Family Center… and thanks to a beautiful team of helpers, we seemed to bless these Pastors in a pretty big way! I learned so many things at that lunch… listening to some of the Pastors as they told us their stories.

• One Pastor told how he had been leading his church for some time… and how he had so many innovative ideas… and how he desired to make his church far more appealing to the younger generations… and how so many of his members were so resistant to change. He felt as if he was IN A CAGE, unable to lead his flock to greener pastures.
• Another Pastor told about how he and his family were recently mutilated by a church wide rebellion… and how much PAIN they have lived through over this past year… and how their daughter has lost her desire for going to church. They asked IN TEARS for us to pray that their daughter would not be destroyed through this ordeal.
• Another Pastor told how something similar had been happening in his church… and how he felt like his time in Pastoral ministry was coming to an end. He explained that he didn’t want to make that decision while in the furnace, but now that the storm was passing somewhat, he could see more clearly… and that he was starting to feel like GOD was releasing him from that post.
• One by one, the stories were told… each one BREAKING MY HEART.

Have you heard… here in America, there are 4000 new churches planted each year? That would be great if it were not for the fact that here in America, there are ALSO 7000 existing church closing their doors. This is a net loss of 3000 churches each year! And while Christianity is growing all over the WORLD, the American church faces the very STARTLING probability of losing 30,000 churches in the next ten years… if something does not change.

This coupled with the fact that pastors and ministers are leaving the ministry at a rate of 1500 per MONTH… or 18,000 per year… GULP! 800 of these leaders attempt suicide EVERY MONTH… many of them succeeding!

Why is this happening?

Well, of course there are many reasons… today I am going to focus on JUST ONE.

Having traveled around the world and visited many countries, I have noticed a deadly glitch of society here in my own fatherland. We have become a rebellious nation… a nation that despises and curses its authorities. We are more swift than any generation in human civilization to uncover the shortcoming of our leaders… we lynch mob the man or woman that slips up and exposes a fault.

We have become bloodthirsty for the violent decapitation of our leaders! We LOVE to hear about the SINS and FAILURES of our leaders… and even though they were merciful to us in our darkest hour… even though they helped us to get back up when WE fell down: just as soon as we FIND SOMETHING to bring them down, we turn on the leader who laid his life down for ours… and we forget about every kind deed done… we forget about all the times they were THERE FOR US IN OUR MIDNIGHT HOURS… we sharpen our teeth and slit the wrist that fed us! And if this doesn’t change… we will kill off all our leaders until we are left WITHOUT A VISION… WITHOUT A DIRECTION… WITHOUT ORDER… in utter chaos, we will drink down the cup of our anarchy.

I’m not going to argue with any of my readers about the obvious corruption in politics and ministry. But I will argue that MOST people enter into leadership with the DESIRE to MAKE A DIFFERENCE… most of them are not monsters when they ANSWER A CALL TO PUBLIC SERVICE. We turn them into monsters…

1. By failing to pray for them as much as we claim we pray for them… leaving them exposed to unbearable degrees of spiritual attack.
2. By failing to HELP share their burden… leaving them overworked and BURNT OUT.
3. By failing to encourage them in challenging moments… leaving them with a sense of worthlessness and hopelessness.
4. By failing to contribute financially… leaving most leaders with a FRACTION of the funds needed to carry out their worthwhile mandates.
5. By expecting leaders to be gods when they are really human like the rest of us… forcing them to PRETEND PERFECTION and live with the discouragement of their own inadequacies.
6. By manipulating our way into lead positions and refusing to step down when we’re obviously not the right fit for the assignment.
7. By failing to HONOR and APPRECIATE our leaders… leaving most leaders wondering if anyone’s benefiting from their service.
8. By whining and complaining about everything from carpet colors, to not getting enough personal attention from our (overworked) leaders, to taking offense over an imperfect comment spoken from a leaders mouth, and so on and so on.

Being a leader for most of my adult life has given me a unique insight into this subject. It seems as if everyone wants to sit in the biggest chair… and it’s ONLY after one pushes his way into the biggest chair… that he realizes how overrated the biggest chair really is!

There is so much more I can say about this… it’s a REAL concern of mine. That if we don’t CHANGE the way we TREAT our leaders… soon, we will be left with a nation of HEARTLESS TYRANTS… because there’s only TWO kinds of leaders who can LEAD a REBELLIOUS society…

1. The people who DON’T CARE about the opinions and feelings of the people they are leading. When they are attacked, they remain standing because they DON’T CARE about anything but the POWER they wield over their personal kingdoms.
2. The people who CARE LIKE JESUS CARES! When these leader are attacked, they remain standing because they REALIZE how MUCH MORE THEY ARE REALLY NEEDED! When attacked, they HURT more than almost everyone else, because they CARE in a bizarre kind of way… but they will not resign, because they have PLEDGED their-selves TO A CAUSE whether by life or death!

I remain in leadership, here in America… because GOD clearly called me and HE has not uncalled me yet. I have a very powerful revelation of this… and the more I am personally exposed to the spirit of our land, the more I personally mutilated with it… the more I realize how badly America needs Jesus Christ!

• My message to all fellow leaders is this: keep your heart pure, love MORE instead of LESS, know that when you are persecuted-you are identifying with Christ’s suffering, find a few REALLY GOOD friends and hold tightly to the hand of God… because YOU ARE THE GREAT HOPE OF THE FUTURE, here in the USA and throughout the entire world!
• My message to American society is this: picture a world where all the TENDER HEARTED leaders are KILLED OFF, and we are plunged into a very dark era of oppression under the heartless rulership of THICK SKINNED TYRANTS. Please, start taking CARE of those who CARE. Feel their pain… RUN TO THEIR RESCUE… refuse to let another well meaning leader fall out of the race! Stop muzzling the ox’s that tread the grain! Honor your leaders, pray for them, love them, and BLESS THEM… before we are REALLY left to DRINK DOWN THE CUP OF OUR ANARCHY!

Passionate blog today… and long! I hope it starts a revolution of LOVE for the good leaders of our land! Love you all… have a super day!

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